You really have to feel sorry for those deceived Mormons. They all look to their temples, and desire to be able to be temple worthy — especially those who want to be married “eternally” in their temples. But, the list of requirements necessary to qualify makes it very difficult to get a “temple recommend”. Consequently, a huge majority of LDS members will never have the opportunity to attend any service or work in a temple. This is why there are HUGE numbers of Mormons who visit new temples before they’ve been consecrated (they are also open to the public for tours, and I toured the Nauvoo Temple in 2002). The carrot is always there, but never able to be eaten by these people. How sad for them never to fulfill their religious desires — and how sad that they don’t realize that this is just a part of their false belief system which keeps them from real salvation.
Very, very interesting story about the whole history behind the Book of Mormon plates. It’s a 46-minute video, but well worth it. How Mormons can watch this story and not understand the fraudulent nature of the BOM story and the entire lie of the LDS church is beyond me. They remain deceived because they are invested in the lie and can’t admit they’ve been had.
The sad fact of the Mormon view of salvation is that it is extremely complex, and one can really never know if they are saved. Midwest Christian Outreach apologetics ministry for many years has a good almost quarterly journal, one of the issues of which had an excellent article on the LDS salvation teaching. It is now on-line here.
Of course for the LDS, the “First Vision” is the foundation of their belief system. If that “First Vision” never happened, then their entire system is fraudulent. I’ve give brief examinations into the “First Vision” story in previous articles, demonstrating how many versions of the “First Vision” there really are, which alone demonstrates it was made up years after the fact. The Utah Lighthouse Ministry has a good synopsis of the “Evolution of the First Vision and Teaching on God in Early Mormonism.”
One has to wonder why the Mormon Church is now releasing photos of Joseph Smith’s “seer stone.” I guess they don’t see a problem with Smith needing an occultic device for “translating” the Book of Mormon. I’d sure like them to give a biblical example where a seer stone is used by any of God’s people.
Mormons are always asking people to read the Book of Mormon and then pray to God about it to see if it is true. I’ve always said that is analogous to praying to God to see if it is okay to commit adultery. This article tells you why we should NOT pray about it.
